That is in their arsenal; they use it on a regular basis and they need to be called out for it because it needs to stop.

HUNTSVILLE, Alabama – U.S. Rep. Mo Brooks, R-Huntsville, maintained course during a Huntsville radio appearance Tuesday morning when asked about his comments Monday that the Democrats are waging a "war on whites."

Brooks spent more than an hour on the show this morning and at one point, Lowery suggested that Brooks was trying to be "provocative" in using the "war on whites" phrase that has garnered Brooks national attention.

"I want the American people to start recognizing what the heck's going on," Brooks said. "When the Democrats bring up race time after time after time, what's the theme? It's skin color. Who are they saying who dislikes whom? They're saying the whites dislike the blacks, the whites dislike the Hispanics and the Democrats are the ones who will protect you from those whites.

"That's the subliminal and sometimes open message."

Brooks pointed to a comment made last month by Democrat Harry Reid, the majority leader in the Senate. Reid criticized the U.S. Supreme Court over the Hobby Lobby ruling (which said companies are not required to provide contraceptives to employees as stated in the Affordable Care Act).

Reid said the Senate was going to work "to ensure that women's lives are not determined by virtue of five white men." Reid drew criticism for the comment because of the five justices who voted against mandating contraceptives, only four were white. The fifth was Clarence Thomas, who is African-American.

"What I'm saying is the Democrats have a political strategy where they try to appeal to the public based on skin color and they are trying to demonize whites in order to get Hispanics to vote Democrat and blacks to vote Democrat and to get Asian-Americans to vote Democrat," Brooks said.

"When the president talks about how Republicans hate, that's a part of that theme. When Harry Reid gets to the Senate floor and he complains about five white guys on the Supreme Court ruling a certain way, what difference does the skin color make?"

Brooks also said "the race card was being played" in 2008 when President Obama and Hillary Clinton were vying for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Brooks said Democrats invoke race to avoid the merits of a public policy discussion.

"That is in their arsenal; they use it on a regular basis and they need to be called out for it because it needs to stop," Brooks said. "If they want to disagree with Republicans based on a public policy issue, then fine. State your public policy position.

"But don't degrade everything down into racism and that seems to be their fallback plan for any kind of legitimate public policy debate that you have."